


Neither Save Nor Destroy

by Thistlerose



Category: Hunger Games Trilogy - Suzanne Collins
Genre: Character Study, Ficlet, Gen, Gen Fic
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-03-31
Updated: 2012-03-31
Packaged: 2017-11-02 20:20:10
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 475
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/372981
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Thistlerose/pseuds/Thistlerose
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Thresh's thoughts as he and Rue are Reaped before the 74th Hunger Games.  Written for <a href="http://kolms.livejournal.com/18020.html">The Girl On Fire Fic-A-Thon</a>.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Neither Save Nor Destroy

The female tribute is selected first, and there’s a collective sigh when the man from the Capitol reads Rue’s name and she stumbles forward. She’s so young and so pretty. Nobody volunteers to take her place, of course. That would be stupid, tantamount to suicide. But they all watch, silent and trembling, as she mounts the stairs and takes the stage, turning slowly to face her audience.

Somewhere off to Thresh’s right, a man lets out a choked sob, and there’s the shuffle of feet as people move forward to comfort him. Thresh assumes it’s the girl’s father. He doesn’t look. His eyes are on Rue, on her beautiful, upturned little face, and he thinks with a sour snort, _She won’t last a day._

It’s not that he doesn’t care, or that he has any desire to see this girl die. But Thresh is a realist. He’s eighteen years old, and in all his life there’s never been a victor from District Eleven. The last victor was Chaff, and that was more than twenty years ago. Tributes from District Eleven usually die in the initial bloodbath. Sending this girl into the arena is … laughable in the sickest and most twisted way.

He hopes that whoever kills her makes it quick.

Then Thresh hears his own name and it’s like being kicked in the spine. 

For a few seconds, he doesn’t move. He _can’t_. He doesn’t know why this should come as a shock; this was always a possibility – a _probability_ , given how many times his name was entered. Unlike the so-called Career Tributes, he’s had no formal training, but he’s spent years making his body strong just in case.

He shouldn’t feel this way, like all the air’s been sucked out of the world.

As he starts forward mechanically, he can feel the eyes of the little girl. He doesn’t look at her as he mounts the stage, and when he’s told to take her hand and shake it, he barely brushes her small fingers with his large, blunted ones.

They stand there together, facing their district, her head barely as high as his elbow. He thinks, _There’s no way she can win, not a chance._ He knows this. He also knows that his own chances are pretty slim, no matter how strong he is, or how skilled he is with certain bladed weapons.

He can’t protect her, not when he’ll be fighting for his life in the arena. 

He can’t kill her either. Not this girl. If she were a little older, a little meaner-looking, if he hadn’t heard her father’s sob…

But she reminds him of a butterfly, and he knows he could never hurt her.

Only tear to pieces anyone who lays a hand on her in the arena.

These Games will cost him his life, not his soul.

3/31/2012


End file.
